


The Slightly Dubious Menu

by rainer76



Category: The A-Team (2010)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-16
Updated: 2011-11-16
Packaged: 2017-10-26 03:22:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/278099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainer76/pseuds/rainer76
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A first meeting between Hannibal and Face.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Slightly Dubious Menu

Hannibal steps into the function room stiffly, back straight under the weight of his shiny new cluster and chafing under the assumption of an arm-chair command. Russ grins at him before returning to his conversation with a Senator’s wife.

Hannibal’s down here at Morrison’s urging, part of a gaggle of Birds overseeing the war-games at Fort Benning, putting junior officers through their paces for a week. Hannibal snags a flute, sips the wine distastefully and casts his eyes over the menu - roasted vegetables with thyme and olive oil, Parmesan mash potato, and succulent prime steak with an option for dessert. Colonel Reid’s wife catches’ his eye, her smile a warm invitation. Smith crosses the floor to play nice with the brass and all their pretty diamonds.

When the meal is finally served it’s something of a surprise. The roasted vegetables are sublime, the mash a warm mix of flavour, but the ravioli clashes with everything.

In the distance, Russ’ calm smile starts to fray at the edges; Hannibal can hear the panic in the chef’s voice. “The steaks where on the truck, colonel, I swear. This was the best I could do on short notice!!!”

He wakes the following morning on Russ’ couch, neck stiff, his dress uniform in disarray. There’s a captain at the door, pale faced as he explains to Morrison. “We found the culprit sir. It was Peck. I have him running Cole Range, on the hour, every three hours, for the next twenty four hours straight.” Hannibal stirs his coffee and steps outside onto the porch, feet braced against the railing as he sits on a wooden chair. Forty-five minutes later he sees a figure hitting the seven-mile obstacle course, his pace steady. Peck finishes it on the hour, exactly, which only gives him two to recover before he has to do it again. Bemused, Hannibal stretches the kinks from his neck and heads back inside. The following morning, at oh-seven hundred sharp, that same figure staggers into camp and face-plants on the parade ground.

“Huh,” Russ says musingly, “didn’t think he’d make it.”

****

By the end of the week, it’s clear Blue team has won five out of the seven skirmishes. Hannibal’s on his last formal dinner, smile fixed in place as he studies the menu - Lobster, on a bed of seafood salad with a garlic marinade. He decides he’s not in the mood to play with the brass. Hannibal shucks his formal uniform, pulls on a grey-t-shirt soft from repeated wash-cycles and goes hunting for the winning Blue team.

He finds them by scent of nose rather than skill and struggles not to choke on cigar-smoke as he laughs. They’re set up behind the mess-pool with the juiciest lobster on offer. Hannibal presumes the brass will be dining on sardines tonight and pulls a beer from a five-gallon drum. The men are in high spirits, laughter drifting on a warm night. “You don’t belong here.” A kid with sharp eyes and a lieutenant’s bar smiles.

“No, I don't. Mind if I join in?”

An easy shrug and the lieutenant lopes away, angling toward a pretty corporal with blonde hair. “Plenty enough to go around.”

It takes Captain Jarvis less than four hours to track them, by then the evidence is consumed, the unit Peck commanded in the last week has scattered, and the only thing left is the assumption (rightly) of guilt. “Cole Range,” Jarvis spits, “on the hour, every three hours, for the next forty-eight hours straight.”

Hannibal turns the beer in his hand, peeling the label away as the kid winks at him. “Worth it,” the lieutenant mouths, then saunters away.

“Colonel,” Jarvis stutters, eyes widening as he finally spots him.

“It's okay, captain,” Hannibal dismisses.

He looks around at the mess. It wasn’t like Peck ate twenty-four lobsters by himself and fair's fair. He heads back to Morrison’s place to grab his running shoes and orders the kid’s transfer simultaneously. If Peck is surprised when a colonel intercepts him halfway through Cole Range then he doesn’t show it. He skips a little to the left, makes room for Smith to settle in beside him, and sizes Hannibal up from the corner of his eye as they run.


End file.
